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The "Monitor"
and the
"Merrimac" by
Gouverneur
Morris

THE STORY OF A PANIC

I

Two long-faced young men and one old man with a long face sat upon the
veranda of the Country Club of Westchester, and looked, now into the
depths of pewter mugs containing mint and ice among other things, and
now across Pelham Bay to the narrow pass of water between Fort Schuyler
and Willets Point. Through this pass the evening fleet of Sound steamers
had already torn with freight and passengers for New Haven, Newport,
Fall River, and Portland; and had already disappeared behind City Island
Point, and in such close order that it had looked as if the Peck,
which led, had been towing the others. The first waves from the
paddle-wheels of the great ships had crossed the three miles of
intervening bay, and were slapping at the base of the seawall that
supported the country club pigeon grounds and lawn-tennis terraces, when
another vessel came slowly and haughtily into view from between the
forts. She was as black as the king of England's brougham, and as smart;
her two masts and her great single funnel were stepped with the most
insolent rake imaginable. Here and there where the light of the setting
sun smote upon polished brass she shone as with pools of fire.

"There she is," said Powers. He had been sitting in his shirt sleeves,
but now he rose and put on his coat as if the sight of the huge and
proud yacht had chilled him. Brett, with a petulant slap, killed a
swollen mosquito against his black silk ankle bone. The old man,
Callender, put his hand to his forehead as if trying to remember
something; and the yacht, steaming slower and slower, and yet, as it
seemed, with more and more grandeur and pride of place—as if she knew
that she gave to the whole bayscape, and the pale Long Island shore
against which she moved in strong relief, an irrefutable note of
dignity—presently stopped and anchored, midway between the forts and
City Island Point; then she began to swing with the tide, until she
faced New York City, from which she had just come.

Callender took his hand from his forehead. He had remembered.

"Young gentlemen," he said, "that yacht of Merriman's has been reminding
me every afternoon for a month of something, and I've just thought what.
You remember one day the Merrimac came down the James, very slowly,
and sunk the Cumberland, and damaged and frightened the Union fleet
into fits, just the way Merriman has been going down to Wall Street
every morning and frightening us into fits? Well, instead of finishing
the work then and there, she suddenly quit and steamed off up the river
in the same insolent, don't-give-a-hoot way that Merriman comes up from
Wall Street every afternoon. Of course, when the Merrimac came down to
finish destroying the fleet the next day, the Monitor had arrived
during the night and gave her fits, and they called the whole thing off.
Anyhow, it's that going-home-to-sleep-on-it expression of the
Merrimac's that I've been seeing in the Sappho."

"You were on the Monitor, weren't you?" asked Powers cheerfully.

The old man did not answer, but he was quite willing that Powers and
Brett, and the whole world for that matter, should think that he had
been. Powers and Brett, though in no cheerful mood, exchanged winks.

"I don't see why history shouldn't repeat itself," said Powers.

"You don't!" said Brett. "Why, because there isn't any Monitor waiting
for Merriman off Wall Street."

"And just like the Civil War," said Callender, "this trouble in the
street is a rich man's quarrel and a poor man's war. Just because old
Merriman is gunning for Waters, you, and I, and the rest of us are about
to go up the spout."

Callender was a jaunty old man, tall, of commanding presence and smart
clothes. His white mustache was the epitome of close-cropped neatness.
When he lost money at poker his brown eyes held exactly the same twinkle
as when he won, and it was current among the young men that he had
played greatly in his day—great games for great stakes. Sometimes he
had made heavy winnings, sometimes he had faced ruin; sometimes his
family went to Newport for the summer and entertained; sometimes they
went to a hotel somewhere in some mountains or other, where they didn't
even have a parlor to themselves. But this summer they were living on in
the town house, keeping just enough rooms open, and a few servants who
had weathered former panics, and who were willing to eat dry bread in
bad times for the sake of the plentiful golden butter that they knew was
to be expected when the country believed in its own prosperity and
future. Just now the country believed that it was going to the dogs. And
Mr. Merriman, the banker, had chosen the opportunity to go gunning for
Mr. Waters, the railroad man. The quarrel between the great men was
personal; and so because of a couple of nasty tempers people were being
ruined daily, honest stocks were selling far below their intrinsic
value, United States Steel had been obliged to cut wages, there was a
strike on in the Pennsylvania coal fields, and the Callenders, as I have
said, were not even going to the cheapest mountain top for the summer.
Brett alone was glad of this, because it meant that little Miss
Callender would occasionally come out to the country club for a game of
tennis and a swim, and, although she had refused to marry him on twenty
distinct occasions, he was not a young man to be easily put from his
purpose. Nor did little Miss Callender propose to be relinquished by him
just yet; and she threw into each refusal just the proper amount of
gentleness and startled-fawn expression to insure another proposal
within a month.

Brett, looking upon Callender as his probable father-in-law, turned to
the old gentleman and said, with guileful innocence:

"Isn't there anything you can do, sir, to hold Merriman off? Powers and
I are in the market a little, but our customers are in heavy, and the
way things are going we've got to break whether we like it or not."

Ordinarily Callender would have pretended that he could have checkmated
Merriman if he had wanted to—for in some things he was a child, and it
humored him to pretend, and to intimate, and to look wise; but on the
present occasion, and much to Powers's and Brett's consternation, he
began to speak to them gravely, and confidentially, and a little
pitifully. They had never before seen him other than jaunty and
debonair, whether his family were at Newport or in the mountains.

"It's all very well for you boys," he said; "you have youth and
resiliency on your side. No matter what happens to you now, in money or
in love, you can come again. But we old fellows, buying and selling with
one foot in the grave, with families accustomed to luxury dependent on
us"—he paused and tugged at his neatly ordered necktie as if to free
his throat for the passage of more air—"some of us old fellows," he
said, "if we go now can never come again—never."

He rose abruptly and walked into the house without a word more; but
Brett, after hesitating a moment, followed him. Mr. Callender had
stopped in front of the "Delinquent List." Seeing Brett at his elbow, he
pointed with a well-groomed finger to his own name at the beginning
of the C's.

"If I died to-night," he said, neither gravely nor jocosely, but as if
rather interested to know whether he would or would not, "the club would
have a hard time to collect that sixteen dollars."

"Are you serious, sir?" Brett asked.

"If to-morrow is a repetition of to-day," said Mr. Callender, "you will
see the name of Callender & Co. in the evening papers." His lips
trembled slightly under his close-cropped mustache.

"Then," said Brett, "this is a good opportunity to ask you, sir, if you
have any objection to me as a candidate for your youngest daughter."

Mr. Callender raised his eyebrows. So small a thing as contemplated
matrimony did not disturb him under the circumstances.

"My boy," he said, "I take it you are in earnest. I don't object to you.
I am sure nobody does."

"Oh, yes," said Brett; "she does."

He had succeeded in making Mr. Callender laugh.

"But," Brett went on, "I'd like your permission to go on trying."

"You have it," said her father. "Will you and Powers dine with me?"

"No," said Brett. "Speaking as candidate to be your son-in-law, you
cannot afford to give us dinner; and in the same way I cannot afford to
buy dinner for you and Powers. So Powers will have to be host and pay
for everything. I shall explain it to him…. But look here, sir, are
you really up against it?"

To Brett's consternation, Callender suddenly buried his face in his
hands and groaned aloud.

"Don't," said Brett; "some one's coming."

Callender recovered his usual poise with a great effort. But no one
came.

"As far as my wishes go, sir," said Brett, "I'm your son. You never had
a son, did you? If you had a son, and if he were young and resilient,
you'd talk to him and explain to him, and in that way, perhaps, you'd
get to see things so clearly in your own mind that you'd be able to
think a way out. Why don't you talk to me as if I were your son? You see
I want to be so very much, and that's half the battle."

Callender often joked about his affairs, but he never talked about them.
Now, however, he looked for a moment keenly into the young man's frank
and intelligent face, hesitated, and then, with a grave and courtly bow,
he waved his hand toward two deep chairs that stood in the corner of the
room half facing each other, as if they themselves were engaged in
conversation.

Twenty minutes later Callender went upstairs to dress for dinner, but
Brett rejoined Powers on the piazza. He sat down without looking at
Powers or speaking to him, and his eyes, crossing the darkening bay,
rested once more on the lordly silhouette of the Sappho. In the
failing light she had lost something of her emphatic outline, and was
beginning to melt, as it were, into the shore.

Brett and Powers were partners. Powers was the floor member of the firm
and Brett ran the office. But they were partners in more ways than the
one, and had been ever since they could remember. As little boys they
had owned things in common without dispute. At St. Marks Powers had
pitched for the nine, and Brett had caught. In their senior year at New
Haven they had played these positions to advantage, both against Harvard
and Princeton. After graduation they had given a year to going around
the world. In Bengal they had shot a tiger, each giving it a mortal
wound. In Siam they had won the doubles championship at lawn tennis.
When one rode on the water wagon the other sat beside him, and vice
versa. Powers's family loved Brett almost as much as they loved Powers,
and if Brett had had a family it would probably have felt about Powers
in the same way.

As far as volume of business and legitimate commissions went, their firm
was a success. It could execute orders with precision, despatch, and
honesty. It could keep its mouth shut. But it had not yet learned to
keep out of the market on its own account. Regularly as a clock ticks
its profits were wiped out in speculation. The young men believed in the
future of the country, and wanted to get rich quick, not because they
were greedy, but because that desire is part of the average American's
nature and equipment. Gradually, however, they were "getting wise," as
the saying is. And they had taken a solemn oath and shaken hands upon
it, that if ever they got out of their present difficulties they would
never again tempt the goddess of fortune.

"Old man's in bad, I guess," said Powers.

"I shouldn't wonder," said Brett, and was ashamed to feel that he must
not be more frank with his partner. "We're all in bad."

"The Cumberland has been sunk," said Powers, "and the rest of us are
aground and helpless, waiting for the Merrimac to come down the river
in the morning." He shook his fist at the distant Sappho. "Why," he
said, "even if we knew what he knows it's too late to do anything,
unless he does it. And he won't. He won't quit firing until Waters
blows up."

"I've a good notion," said Brett, "to get out my pigeon gun, take the
club launch, board the Sappho about midnight, hold the gun to old
Merriman's head, and make him promise to save the country; or else make
him put to sea, and keep him there. If he were kidnapped and couldn't
unload any more securities, the market would pull up by itself." The
young men chuckled, for the idea amused them in spite of their troubles.

By a common impulse they turned and looked at the club's thirty-foot
naphtha launch at anchor off the club's dock; and by a common impulse
they both pointed at her, and both exclaimed:

"The Monitor!"

Then, of course, they were very careful not to say anything more until
they had crooked together the little fingers of their right hands, and
in silence registered a wish each. Then each spoke the name of a famous
poet, and the spell was ended.

"What did you wish?" said Brett idly.

Powers could be very courtly and old fashioned.

"My dear boy," he said, "I fancy that I wished for you just what you
wished for yourself."

Before this they had never spoken about her to each other.

"I didn't know that you knew," said Brett. "Thanks."

They shook hands. Then Brett broke into his gay, happy laugh.

"That," said he, "is why you have to pay for dinner for Mr. Callender
and me."

"Are we to dine?" asked Powers, "before attacking the Merrimac?"

"Always," assented Brett, "and we are to dress first."

The two young men rose and went into the house, Powers resting his hand
affectionately on Brett's further shoulder. It was so that they had come
off the field after striking out Harvard's last chance to score.

At dinner Mr. Callender, as became his age and experience, told the
young men many clean and amusing stories. Though the clouds were thick
about his head he had recovered his poise and his twinkling eye of the
good loser. Let his night be sleepless, let the morrow crush him, but
let his young friends remember that he had gone to his execution calm,
courteous, and amusing, his mustache trimmed, his face close-shaved, his
nails clean and polished. They had often, he knew, laughed at him for
his pretensions, and his affectation of mysterious knowledge, and all
his little vanities and superiorities, but they would remember him for
the very real nerve and courage that he was showing, and knew that he
was showing. The old gentleman took pleasure in thinking that although
he was about to fail in affairs, he was not going to fail in character.
He even began to make vague plans for trying again, and when, after a
long dinner, they pushed back their chairs and rose from the table,
there was a youthful resiliency in the voice with which he challenged
Powers to a game of piquet.

"That seems to leave me out," said Brett.

"Well," said Mr. Callender, with snapping eyes, "can you play well
enough to be an interesting opponent, or can't you?"

"No, I can't," said Brett. "And anyway, I'm going out in the launch to
talk things over with Merriman." He shrugged his shoulders in a superior
way, and they laughed; but when they had left him for the card-room he
walked out on the veranda and stood looking through the darkness at the
Sappho's distant lights, and he might have been heard muttering, as if
from the depths of very deep thought:

"Why not?"

II

At first Brett did not head the launch straight for the Sappho. He was
not sure in his own mind whether he intended to visit her, or just to
have a near-by look at her and then return to the club. He had ordered
the launch on an impulse which he could not explain to himself. If she
had been got ready for him promptly he might not have cared at the last
minute to go out in her at all. But there had been a long delay in
finding the engineer, and this had provoked him and made him very sure
that he wanted to use the launch very much. And it hadn't smoothed his
temper to learn that the engineer had been found in the kitchen eating a
Virginia ham in company with the kitchen maid.

But the warmth and salt freshness that came into his face, and the
softness and great number of the stars soon pacified him. If she were
only with him, he thought, if her father were only not on the brink of
ruin, how pleasant the world would be. He pretended that she was with
him, just at his shoulder, where he could not see her, but there just
the same, and that he was steering the launch straight for the ends of
the world. He pretended that for such a voyage the launch would not need
an engineer. He wondered if under the circumstances it would be safe to
steer with only one hand.

But the launch ran suddenly into an oyster stake that went rasping aft
along her side, and at the same moment the searchlight from Fort
Schuyler beamed with dazzling playfulness in his face, and then having
half blinded him wheeled heavenward, a narrow cornucopia of light that
petered out just short of the stars. He watched the searchlight. He
wondered how many pairs of lovers it had discovered along the shores of
Pelham Bay, how many mint-juleps it had seen drunk on the veranda of the
country club, how many kisses it had interrupted; and whether it would
rather pry into people's private affairs or look for torpedo-boats and
night attacks in time of war. But most of all he wondered why it spent
so much of its light on space, sweeping the heavens like a fiery broom
with indefatigable zeal. There were no lovers or torpedo-boats up there.
Even the birds were in bed, and the Wright brothers were known to be
at Pau.

Once more the searchlight smote him full in the face and then, as if
making a pointed gesture, swept from him, and for a long second
illuminated the black hull and the yellow spars of the Sappho. Then,
as if its earthly business were over, the shaft of light, lengthening
and lengthening as it rose above intervening obstacles, the bay, the
Stepping Stone light, the Long Island shore, turned slowly upward until
it pointed at the zenith. Then it went out.

"That," thought Brett, "was almost a hint. First it stirred me up; then
it pointed at the Sappho; then it indicated that there is One above,
and then it went out."

He headed the launch straight for the Sappho, and began to wonder what
one had to do to get aboard of a magnate's yacht at night. He turned to
the engineer.

"Gryce," he said, "what do you know about yachts?"

"What about 'em?" Gryce answered sulkily. He was still thinking of the
kitchen-maid and the unfinished ham, or else of the ham and the
unfinished kitchen maid, I am not sure which.

"What about 'em?" Brett echoed. "Do they take up their gangways at
night?"

"Unless some one's expected," said Gryce.

"Do they have a watchman?"

"One forward and one aft on big yachts."

"Making two," said Brett. "But aren't there usually two gangways—one
for the crew and one for the owner's guests?"

"Crew's gangway is to starboard," Gryce vouchsafed.

Brett wondered if there was anything else that he ought to know. Then,
in picturing himself as running the launch alongside the Sappho, and
hoping that he would not bump her, a question presented itself.

"If I were going to visit the Sappho," he asked, "would I approach the
gangway from the stern or from the bow?"

"I don't know," said Gryce.

"Do you mean," said Brett, "that you don't know which is the correct
thing to do, or that you think I can't steer?"

"I mean," said Gryce, "that I know it's one or the other, but I don't
know which."

"In that case," said Brett, "we will approach from the rear. That is
always the better part of valor. But if the gangway has been taken up
for the night I don't know what I shall do."

"The gangway was down when the light was on her," said Gryce. "I seen
it."

And that it was still down Brett could presently see for himself. He
doubted his ability to make a neat landing, but they seemed to be
expecting him, for a sailor ran down to the gangway landing armed with
a long boat-hook, and made the matter easy for him. When he had reached
the Sappho's deck an officer came forward in the darkness, and said:

"Mr. Merriman," said the latter, "told us to expect you half an hour ago
in a motor-boat. Did you have a breakdown?"

"No," said Brett, and he added mentally, "but I'm liable to."

They descended a companionway; the officer opened a sliding door of some
rich wood, and Brett stepped into the highly lighted main saloon of
the Sappho.

In one corner of the room, with his back turned, the famous Mr. Merriman
sat at an upright piano, lugubriously drumming. Brett had often heard of
the great man's secret vice, and now the sight of him hard at it made
him, in spite of the very real trepidation under which he was laboring,
feel good-natured all over—the Colossus of finance was so earnest at
his music, so painstaking and interested in placing his thick, clumsy
fingers, and so frankly delighted with the effect of his performance
upon his own ear. It seemed to Brett homely and pleasant, the thought
that one of the most important people of eighty millions should find
his pleasure in an art for which he had neither gift nor training.

Mr. Merriman finished his piece with a badly fumbled chord, and turned
from the piano with something like the show of reluctance with which a
man turns from a girl who has refused him. That Mr. Merriman did not
start or change expression on seeing a stranger in the very heart of his
privacy was also in keeping with his reputed character. It was also like
him to look steadily at the young man for quite a long while before
speaking. But finally to be addressed in courteous and pleasant tones
was not what Brett expected. For this he had his own good looks to
thank, as Mr. Merriman hated, with the exception of his own music,
everything that was ugly.

"Good-evening, sir," said Mr. Merriman. "But I can't for the life of me
think what you are doing on my yacht. I was expecting a man, but
not you."

"You couldn't guess," said Brett, "why I have been so impertinent as to
call upon you without an invitation."

"Then," said Mr. Merriman, "perhaps you had better tell me. I think I
have seen you before."

"My name is Brett," said Brett. "You may have seen me trying to play
tennis at Newport. I have often seen you there, looking on."

"You didn't come to accuse me of being a looker-on?" Mr. Merriman asked.

"No, sir," said Brett, "but I do wish that could have been the reason.
I've come, sir, as a matter of fact, because you are, on the contrary,
so very, very active in the game."

"I don't understand," said Merriman rather coldly,

"Oh," said Brett, "everybody I care for in the world is being ruined,
including myself, and I said, 'Mr. Merriman could save us all if he only
would.' So I came to ask you if you couldn't see your way to letting up
on us all."

"'Mr. Brett," said Mr. Merriman, "you may have heard, since gossip
occasionally concerns herself with me, that in my youth I was a priest."

Brett nodded.

"Well," continued Mr. Merriman, "I have never before listened to so
naïve a confession as yours."

Brett blushed to his eyes.

"I knew when I came," he said, "that I shouldn't know how to go about
what I've come for."

"But I think I have a better opinion of you," smiled Mr. Merriman, and
his smile was very engaging. "You have been frank without being fresh,
you have been bashful without showing fear. You meet the eye in a manly
way, and you seem a clean and worthy young man. As opposed to these
things, what you might have thought out to say to me would
hardly matter."

"Oh," cried Brett impulsively, "if you would only let up!"

"I suppose, Mr. Brett," the banker smiled, even more engagingly, "that
you mean you would like me to come to the personal rescue of all those
persons who have recently shown bad judgment in the conduct of their
affairs. But let me tell you that I have precisely your own objections
to seeing people go to smash. But they will do it. They don't even
come to me for advice."

"You wouldn't give it to them if they did," said Brett.

"No," said Mr. Merriman, "I couldn't. But I should like to, and a piece
of my mind to boot. Now, sir, you have suggested something for me to do.
Will you go further and tell me how I am to do it?"

"Why," said Brett, diffidently but unabashed, "you could start in early
to-morrow morning, couldn't you, and bull the market?"

"Mr. Brett," said Mr. Merriman forcefully, "I have for the last month
been straining my resources to hold the market. But it is too heavy,
sir, for one pair of shoulders."

A look of doubt must have crossed Brett's face, for the banker smote his
right fist into the palm of his left hand with considerable violence,
and rose to his feet, almost menacingly.

"Have the courtesy not to doubt my statements, young sir," he said
sharply. "I have made light of your intrusion; see that you do not make
light of the courtesy and consideration thus shown you."

"Of course, I believe you," said Brett, and he did.

"You are one of those," said Mr. Merriman, "who listen to what the run
of people say, and make capital of it."

"Come, come," said the great man, in a mocking voice. "You are here
without an invitation. Entertain me! Entertain me! Make good!"

Brett was nettled.

"Well," said he, "they say that Mr. Waters was tremendously extended for
a rise in stocks, and that you found it out, and that you hate him, and
that you went for him to give him a lesson, and that you pulled all the
props out of the market, and smashed it all to pieces, just for a
private spite. That's what they say!"

The banker was silent for quite a long time.

"If there wasn't something awful about that," he said at last, "it would
be very funny."

The officer who had ushered Brett into the saloon appeared at the door.

"Well?" said Merriman curtly.

"There's a gentleman," said the officer, "who wants to come aboard. He
says you are expecting him. But as you only mentioned one gentleman—"

"Yes, yes," said Merriman, "I'm expecting this other gentleman, too."

He turned to Brett.

"I am going to ask you to remain," he said, "to assist at a conference
on the present state of the market between yourself, and myself, and my
arch-enemy—Mr. Waters."

III

Even if Brett should live to be a distinguished financier himself—which
is not likely—he will never forget that midnight conference on board
the Sappho. He had supposed that famous men—unless they were dead
statesmen—thought only of themselves, and how they might best and most
easily increase their own power and wealth. He had believed with the
rest of the smaller Wall Street interests that the present difficulties
were the result of a private feud. Instead of this he now saw that the
supposed quarrellers had forgotten their differences, and were in the
closest kind of an alliance to save the situation. He discovered that
until prices had fallen fifty points neither of them had been in the
market to any significant extent; and that, to avert the appalling
calamities which seemed imminent, both were ready if necessary to
impoverish themselves or to take unusual risks of so doing. He learned
the real causes of the panic, so far as these were not hidden from
Merriman and Waters themselves, and when at last the two men decided
what should be attempted, to what strategic points they should send
re-enforcements, and just what assistance they should ask the Secretary
of the Treasury to furnish, Brett felt that he had seen history in
the making.

Waters left the Sappho at one in the morning, and Brett was for going,
too, but Merriman laid a hand on the young man's shoulder and asked him
to remain for a few moments.

"Now, my son," he said, "you see how the panic has affected some of the
so-called big interests. It may be that Waters and I can't do very much.
But it will be good for you to remember that we tried; it will make you
perhaps see others in a more tolerant light. But for purposes of
conversation you will, of course, forget that you have been here. Now,
as to your own affairs—"

Mr. Merriman looked old and tired, but very indulgent and kind.

"Knowing what I know now," said Brett, "I would rather take my chances
with the other little fools who have made so much trouble for you and
Mr. Waters. If your schemes work out I'll be saved in spite of myself;
and if they don't—well, I hope I've learned not to be so great a
fool again."

"In every honest young man," said Merriman, "there is something of the
early Christian—he is very noble and very silly. Write your name and
telephone number on that sheet of paper. At least, you won't refuse
orders from me in the morning. Waters and I will have to use many
brokers to-morrow, of whom I hope you will consent to be one."

Brett hung his head in pleasure and shame. Then he looked Mr. Merriman
in the face with a bright smile.

"If you've got to help some private individual, Mr. Merriman, I'd rather
you didn't make it me; I'd rather you made it old man Callender. If he
goes under now he'll never get to the top again."

"Not Samuel B. Callender?" said Merriman, with a note of surprise and
very real interest in his voice. "Is he in trouble? I didn't know. Why,
that will never do—a fine old fighting character like that—and
besides … why, wouldn't you have thought that he would have come to
me himself or that at least he would have confided in my son Jim?"

Brett winced.

Merriman wrote something upon a card and handed it to Brett.

"Can you see that he gets that?" he asked.

"Yes, sir," said Brett.

"Tell him, then, to present it at my office the first thing in the
morning. It will get him straight to me. I can't stand idle and see the
father of the girl my boy is going to marry ruined."

"I didn't know—" said Brett. He was very white, and his lips trembled
in spite of his best efforts to control them. "I congratulate you, sir.
She is very lovely," he added.

Mr. Merriman regarded the miserable young man quizzically.

"But," he said, "Mr. Callender has three daughters."

"Oh, no," said Brett dismally, "there is only the one."

"My boy," said Mr. Merriman, "I am afraid that you are an incorrigible
plunger—at stocks, at romance, and at conclusions. I don't know if I am
going to comfort you or give you pain, but the girl my son is going to
marry is Mary Callender."

The color returned to Brett's cheek and the sparkle to his eyes. He
grasped Mr. Merriman by both hands, and in a confidential voice he said: